Sony tries to make good after PlayStation network outage

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FILE- This March 8, 2012 file photo shows attendees walking past the Sony PlayStation PS Vita console on display in the Sony PlayStation booth at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. Sony's PlayStation network remains offline on Frday, Dec. 26, 2014, in an outage that began as video game players unwrapped new consoles on Christmas. Microsoft's Xbox Live service, which had also gone down, is back online but the company says some applications aren't fully functioning. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma, File)

LOS ANGELES — Sony offered disgruntled gamers a “holiday thank you” to ring in the New Year, extending PlayStation Plus memberships and offering a one-time discount after a Christmastime cyber attack left its networks offline.

The thank you includes five extra days added to a member’s subscription, Eric Lempel, vice president of Sony Network Entertainment, wrote in a blog post Thursday.

The company will also grant a one-time 10 percent total cart purchase discount for the PlayStation Store for all PlayStation Network members some time this month.

The hacker group Lizard Squad claimed responsibility for disrupting Sony’s PlayStation network and Microsoft’s Xbox Live network on Christmas Day with attacks that overwhelmed servers.

Users reported difficulty redeeming download codes and creating new accounts, while existing PlayStation Network members had trouble logging into their accounts.

Sony’s offer drew mixed reactions from those affected. The Los Angeles Times contacted several through Facebook.

For some, the extension and discount are more than enough to make up for a few days of network problems. Robert Taylor doesn’t think Sony is obligated to offer PlayStation users any discounts because the server errors weren’t the company’s fault.

“It’s not like the servers went down because they went down. A bunch of kids decided to overload the servers with DDoS just to (mess with) Christmas for a lot of people,” Taylor, 30, said.

Peter Beer said he no longer trusts Sony’s security.

“Since the last time Sony got hacked and my credit card was compromised, I’ve made a separate credit card account and email for all my Sony accounting,” he said, referring to a 2011 outage that left PlayStation’s network out for more than 20 days. “It’s 2015, maybe you need to hire some more kids born in ’94 who can deal with these problems.”

The extended membership fell short for Bryan Nguyen, who said the offer doesn’t make up for a lackluster Christmas weekend.

“Considering the importance of Christmas as the day that so many kids and gamers finally get to play the games they’ve been waiting to open, five extended days and 10 percent off of money that we have to spend is not reparations,” Nguyen, 25, said. “It’s giving us what we deserved outright from the beginning and forcing us to spend more in the faulty tech company in order to reap the 10 percent benefit.”